FEATURED ARTICLES ABOUT KAUSHIK BASU - PAGE 3

NEW DELHI: A top policymaker has called for monitoring of concessional housing loans, soon after the central bank raised concerns over such loans and made it costly for banks to extend them. Instead of banning teaser rates, independent experts could be asked to keep an eye on them, chief economic advisor Kaushik Basu said. "We can have a professional body that will have the right to say whether you are making a good judgement or not," he said on Tuesday. The Reserve Bank of India has repeatedly raised concerns over such loans and said banks need to explain to their borrowers about the implications of such rates and to appraise repaying capacity of the borrowers when the rates go up. After its warnings went unheeded, RBI directed banks to increase the provisioning on teaser loans in its November 2 policy review to make such loans less attractive . The provisioning requirement was raised from 0.40% to 2%. Mr Basu recalled the role of such loans in the US subprime crisis, and said regulation of the schemes announced by various banks should be decided on a case-by-case basis.

NEW DELHI: India's economy could expand by around 6 per cent in 2013, World Bank Chief Economist Kaushik Basu said today, attributing the current slowdown to global factors. "It is very-very difficult time for the world... The World Bank's rough expectation is that in the calender year 2013, India is going to see growth rate of just short of 6 per cent," said Basu at C D Deshmukh Memorial Lecture here. Officially, the World Bank is slated to release global growth projections on January 15. Amid global slowdown impacting India, the government had lowered the country's economic growth for the 2012-13 fiscal to 5.7-5.9 per cent from its earlier projection of 7.6 per cent.

Is there a Raghuram Rajan stamp on the Economic Survey 2012-13? Yes and no. While following the broad pattern of previous Surveys, Rajan formerly Professor of Finance at the Booth School of Business, University of Chicago , has brought his own touch to an otherwise austere document. For one, it's a leaner, but not necessarily a meaner, document! But that's not all. ET brings you a list of what's different in this year's Survey as compared to the Survey prepared by his predecessor, Kaushik Basu , formerly Professor of Economics at Cornell University.

WASHINGTON: Major economic reforms in India would hit the roadblock and are unlikely to happen before the next Parliamentary elections in 2014, Chief Economic Advisor Kaushik Basu has said. Addressing a meeting at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace , an eminent Washington-based think tank, Basu said that relatively less important bills might go through Parliament. Post-2014, he said, "you would see a rush of important reforms" and after 2015 India would be one of the "fastest growing" economies of the world.

NEW DELHI: Advocating partial decontrol in the diesel price , Chief Economic Advisor Kaushik Basu today said a report on deregulation is expected to be finalised by next week. "We feel we should go towards virtually full decontrol. We can't do it at one go, you do want to shelter the consumers as much as possible, but you have to tell people to learn to live with some upward and downward movement in prices," he said on the sideline of an event organised by IMI. "We comment on all (diesel, kerosene, LPG)

NEW DELHI: The government has appointed noted economist and Cornell University professor Kaushik Basu as chief economic adviser to the finance ministry at the rank and pay of a secretary to the government of India. The Appointments Committee of Cabinet (ACC), chaired by the Prime Minister, formally approved his appointment, an official in the department of personnel and training (DoPT) said on the condition of anonymity. A finance ministry official told SundayET that Mr Basu who is replacing Arvind Virmani as chief economic adviser, would join in the first week of December.

NEW DELHI: With the rupee sliding below the 63 mark against US dollar, World Bank Chief Economist KaushikBasu today said the country should use forex reserves to curb volatility in the currency market and not to look to IMF for funds. "To use certain amount of your forex to buy and sell dollar I think (is) a good idea...(It) gives out signal that reserve has a purpose. That is broadly the direction we should go and use reserves to curb turbulence", he said while delivering the 16th JRD Tata Memorial Lecture here.

NEW DELHI: Amid controversies related to coal block allocations and sale of government's stake in ONGC through auction route, Chief Economic Advisor Kaushik Basu on Friday said India is new to the art of auction and efforts are needed to improve the process. "India is new to this art of auction. So yes we will be learning. We will be improving on it and I am sure what we have done in the past have left us with some scope for improvement," Basu told reporters on the sidelines of an event here.

NEW DELHI: Ashoka University, an upcoming educational institution, today announced its academic council comprising of eminent personalities like World Bank Chief Economist Kaushik Basu , author and historian Ramachandra Guha among others. Andre Beteille, who is currently the Professor of Sociology at the Delhi School of Economics (DSE) at the University of Delhi, will be the Honourable Chairperson of the Council. The University has strategic tie-ups with the University of Pennsylvania and Carleton College to help bring the US model of four-year undergraduate programme (FYUP)

NEW DELHI: The government today said it is hopeful that the rally in crude oil prices due to the ongoing political turmoil in MENA (Middle East and North Africa )region will be short-lived. "If you look at futures market also, there is expectation that this (crude oil prices) is going to go down. So overall, my expectation is that this very high price regime is not going to last," Chief Economic Advisor Kaushik Basu told PTI. Crude prices, which has become a big concern for the government fighting inflation, softened to about USD 104 to a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange after touching USD 107 a barrel, its highest level since September 2008.